Speedy gets "RUSH"-ed!

[chuckamuck43]

Had the car radio on just now and Rush Limbaugh read a story about Cartoon Network's banning of Speedy Gonzales!

He cited the Hispanic Online Story and said that there is a movement begun by an Indianapolis Media Consultant to get the Speedy cartoons returned to regular rotation.

I can't remember all the details, but I know that the program is archived at the Rush Limbaugh website, so maybe I'll try to access it tonght.

Regardless of the source (I know Limbaugh has the effect of polarizing people) this is a great thing! His audience is HUGE, so one of our pet issues has just been nationally publicised.

[barnyarddawg]

Originally posted by chuckamuck43
Had the car radio on just now and Rush Limbaugh read a story about Cartoon Network's banning of Speedy Gonzales!

He cited the Hispanic Online Story and said that there is a movement begun by an Indianapolis Media Consultant to get the Speedy cartoons returned to regular rotation.

I can't remember all the details, but I know that the program is archived at the Rush Limbaugh website, so maybe I'll try to access it tonght.

Regardless of the source (I know Limbaugh has the effect of polarizing people) this is a great thing! His audience is HUGE, so one of our pet issues has just been nationally publicised.

:cool: :cool: :cool: :cool:

[all41]

Rush and Fox are using the radical "politically correct" censorship of Speedy as a "club" to beat up CNN cable networks and Turner. More power to them, I say. Their "we know what's good for you" attitude deserves abuse. Rush et all understand how the "average" person might not grasp some of the complexities of politics but they do understand that censoring a cartoon mouse is a stupid idea, hence those that cooked up the idea of banning Speedy are stupid.

This type of political pressure is the only thing that seems to work today. Yet I doubt it'll have any impact. The PC crowd can be spooked by the left (Jesse Jackson threatening a boycott) but will wear resistance to Rush and Fox News as a badge of honor. Remember last years June Bugs with the Wall Street Journal article?

[Corran Horn]

My last name is Gonzalez and I say showing Speedy Gonzales is ok.

Does that count for anything? :)

[Cyclops]

I think that counts Corran.

Shoot I'm Mexican, and I like Speedy.

[Jon Cooke]

Check out Rush's website! :cool: :cool:

Wish I could have heard the show!

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_032702/content/stack_d.guest.html



-Jon

[don Jaime]

Great. Just great. Now I have Dittohead cookies on my computer. God knows what insane spam I will get.

I don't like Limbaugh. His understanding of the world is really lousy. But even he can see this is ridiculous, so thanks, R.L.

Also, he looks like Larry Miller's twin.

[J Lee]

I don't like Limbaugh. His understanding of the world is really lousy. But even he can see this is ridiculous, so thanks, R.L.

Sixty years ago most of the censorship of cartoons and other films came from the right -- mainly the problem after the 1934 code was adopted was anything considered to involve sex or making fun of religion. That's why Freleng's "Clean Pastures" was held up from being releised for about five months; not because of the racial charactures that keep it off TV today, but because it was considered offensive to some Christians.

But over the past 40 years, the bulk of the censorship problems have come from the left -- mainly from people who are are trying to "protect" everyone from racial stereotypes like Speedy, or from "children's television" activists who have decried the violence in Warners and other Hollywood cartoons since the 1960s.

In the past 15 years, the only major censorship issue that has come from the right has been the Rev. Donald Wildman's demand that CBS take off Ralph Bakshi's Might Mouse cartoon over the flower petals/cocaine connection. That was pretty morinic in of itself, but the press response to that has been (until the last few days) far greater than anything involving the Speedy Gonzales ban, because to a lot of people in the press, bashing Rev. Wildman is a lot of fun, while bashing the people who are keeping Speedy off the air could get you branded a racist, and then you won't be invited to any of the right social gatherings anymore (I'm exaturating here, but only slightly).

So much of the mainstream press at the major New York offices, even if they themselves think banning Speedy is ridiculous aren't going to touch this story with a 10-foot pole, because they do not want to be on the wrong side of a political correctness issue. That's why in a situation like this, you have to take your allies where you can find them, and your allies are going to be people like Limbaugh or Fox News, because they like to give the PC people shots all the time, especially when it involves the hypocrite king of PC, Ted Turner.

Now, if Rev. Wildman ever comes back and goes after "The Powerpuff Girls" or "Cow and Chicken" for showing improper images of Satan, don't expect Rush to be on your side. But you could expect major news stories about the persecution of Bubbles, Buttercup and Blossom because in this case, they'd be on the right side of the PC argument.

[don Jaime]

How quickly we forget Married with Children, the target of a letter writing campaign. Or 2 Live Crew in Broward County. Or any number of other attempts at censorship from the right.

Ah, but you're talking about cartoons. Ren and Stimpy was hit from within, and I don't know how it would be aligned politically. Beavis and Butthead was a popular whipping boy for the family values crowd. Wildman popped up just recently challenging Taco Bell's Cardcaptors promotion for "promoting witchcraft." Taco Bell pulled the promotion as a result. Limbaugh hasn't weighed in on that one, probably because neither he nor most of the adult American population is familiar with the show.

[J Lee]

Ah, but here's the difference -- the protests on the right against Beavis and Butthead were not taken serioulsly in the mainstream press, and the publicity just spurred Viacom and Paramount on to do a feature-length movie that grossed (kind of appropriate word there, don't you think?) about $100 million. And while Nickelodeon/Viacom had some initial qualms about the basic content of "Ren and Stimpy," their problem was more creative differnces with John K, and not with the fart/pee/poop joke gendre itself. If there had been a problem, Cartoon Network wouldn't have run out and created their own clones "Cow and Chicken" a few years later.

I'm not saying there aren't people on the right who are trying to censor things, just that in the current political climate, they have little traction to get their way. In contrast, the censorship complaints on the left get a much wider hearing and much wider support right now, even if some the concerns are as bonheaded as those of the Rev. Wildman. If some anti-smoking PC group went to CN tomorrow and demanded that all of the cigarette scenes be edited from the Warners and MGM cartoons, do you dobut those images would be gone by the end of April?

[don Jaime]

Yes, I doubt that. I also doubt that the press is left-leaning, or that the left recieves much hearing at all.

Beavis and Butt-head were taken very seriously, with plenty of what-about-the-children hand wringing on the right, including the mainstream press. It stayed on the air, but at a late time slot.

[Matthew Hunter]

But Beavis and Butthead were'nt made for children anyway. And it wasn't marketed as such. My opinion on those 'mature' themed cartoons is that if it's unacceptable to children, don't let them watch it, and don't sell it to them. Shouldn't be the network's job to babysit, but it's their responsibility to be careful. I think MTV was, certainly more so than they are about 90 percent of the programs they run now. Comedy Central licensed South Park toys when the show is definitely not for kids, and that's what I had a problem with.
-Matthew

[J Lee]

Yes, I doubt that. I also doubt that the press is left-leaning, or that the left recieves much hearing at all.

The press is urban, and most of the complaints from people that classic cartoon fans have problems with right now are urban. The complaints of people like the Rev. Wildman, coming from the religous right, are mostly rural, where the major newspapers, TV networks and corporations don't live, and so don't interact as much with the companies and media outlets who shape what we can and can't watch on television.

If, for example, CN wanted to start airing the Inki cartoons again, they have to think about the possibility of Al Shapton protesting outside the AOL Time Warner Building on 51st St. between Fifth and Sixth Ave. in New York -- if he thinks he can get press coverage. But of coutse, the press covers it because Al Shapton's there, which creates a vicious cycle, because he's always good copy and sells papers/draws ratings. Therefore, to avoid the problem to begin with, AOL Time Warner doesn't show Inki and doesn't think about putting him back on their air, even as innocuous as those Jones cartoons are.

On the other hand, Donald Wildmon can stage his protest against Mighty Mouse, and he has direct mail and religious radio station access to much of the nation, but the fact remains, he's down in Mississippi away from the major media outlets, and if he goes to them to protest he sticks out like Ma and Pa Kettle in the Big City -- certainly nothing the press is going to treat with respect, though the corporate execs might if they think he has enough support in the heartland.

The Speedy conflict involves the same dynamic -- mdeia-savy activists putting pressure on AOL Time Warner in an urban setting, so that the company is afraid the activists -- never mind that they don't actually represent anybody but themselves -- would draw the TV cameras and the press to their protest against showing this alleged racially degrading symbol, so they just say "Why risk the problem? Let's just pull the cartoons."

And if some within AOL Time Warner or in the press actually speak up and question the reasoning behind pulling Speedy, or Inki, or any of the Indian-themed cartoons, they risk being branded anti-whatever by those same activists. Meanwhile, for the majority of the "important" people in the major media markets (New York, L.A. and Washington) who are paying little or no attention to the basis of the story, all they gleam out of it is, "Political activist X called AOL T/W executive Y or reporter Z a racist for even questioning why 'Gonzales Tamales' should not be taken off the air," that's the image that sticks -- executive Y or reporter Z is now and forever branded as a racist because he/she is against something as ridiculous as taking Speedy Gonzales off the air. They don't want that, so that cartoon is removed and debate over the removal of the cartoon is muffled.

This may sound like bizarre logic, but that's where most parts of the political correctness movement eventually end up.

[don Jaime]

Not bizarre at all, it clears up a lot for me. It makes a lot more sense framed in urban/rural discussion. Thanks, J.